When the petition drive to collect signatures to qualify the measure for the 1978 measure started, members of the Illinois General Assembly drew two years' advance pay at the start of each two-year session. As the petition drive gained momentum, the legislature pushed through a bill to end that practice.[1]

The proposed 1978 amendment was the object of a lawsuit before it went to the ballot; the result of this lawsuit was that the Illinois Supreme Court said it could not be on the ballot on the grounds that it violated the part of the Illinois Constitution that says that citizen initiatives can only deal with "structural and procedural" aspects of Article IV of the Illinois Constitution.[1]

The "Illinois Initiative" would have provided Illinois voters with the right to enact statutes through the ballot initiative process.[2]